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Can you elaborate why? Given only one person could survive the event, there didn't seem to be any play/strategy to him declaring his affections for Katniss from the viewpoint of duplicity without some degree of foresight as to how things would play out. He could never know that things would work out the way that they did.

'cos it was clear that he had a thing for her and she knew he liked her, so basically she used that to survive.

Right now I'm reading Brave New World. So far its not quite what I'd expected - similar in some ways to 1984, but mostly very, very different.

It isn't nearly as gut-wrenchingly horrifying as 1984, that's for sure. Brave New World come across as a 'mere' cautionary tale, whereas 1984 wants to grind your face into the mud until you acknowledge your own powerlessness. To put it another way, Brave New World was for me a mostly intellectual experience, whereas the greater part of 1984's effect on me was at the emotional level.

Eh. I understood both BNW and 1984 on an intellectual level - and the third in that dystopian trio would likely be We by Yevgeny Zamyatin - but for gut-wrenching, the first book that comes to mind is Burmese Days.

NalanoH. Wildmoon
Director of the Friends of Nalano PAC
Attorney at Lawl
"His lack of education is more than compensated for by his keenly developed moral bankruptcy." - Woody Allen

Eh. I understood both BNW and 1984 on an intellectual level - and the third in that dystopian trio would likely be We by Yevgeny Zamyatin - but for gut-wrenching, the first book that comes to mind is Burmese Days.

The baby of the trio is Nineteen Eighty-Four. If you merge We and Brave New World, chances are the offspring would be Orwell's book. It's got the looks of its mother (We), possibly its fathers attitude (Brave New World). BNW is, funnily enough, the only one of the three I've not read.

The baby of the trio is Nineteen Eighty-Four. If you merge We and Brave New World, chances are the offspring would be Orwell's book. It's got the looks of its mother (We), possibly its fathers attitude (Brave New World). BNW is, funnily enough, the only one of the three I've not read.

BNW reads like a critique of consumerism as a culture more than of totalitarianism as a mode of governance. At any rate.

Edit: Speaking of a reality comprised entirely of media marketing, there's also The Dick Gibson Show by Stanley Elkin.

Last edited by Nalano; 06-05-2012 at 08:31 PM.

NalanoH. Wildmoon
Director of the Friends of Nalano PAC
Attorney at Lawl
"His lack of education is more than compensated for by his keenly developed moral bankruptcy." - Woody Allen

He's like a lovestruck puppy. Katniss could boot him off a waterfall and he'd come back.

See this is the problem, he's just too passive. Also I thought you'd like the character of Katniss tbh (strong, pragmatic determined female), what's with the hatin? Or do I need to read the rest of the trilogy to find out?

BNW reads like a critique of consumerism as a culture more than of totalitarianism as a mode of governance. At any rate.

I agree with this, a lot of the stuff that is famous to the book is actually really a small part of the book. I was surprised that it really is a escape romance novel set in a dystopian world with a little bit of social commentry in there. Its not what people think when they hear about it.

This book is not available in local retails here for very obvious reason, but for whatever channels you obtain a copy of this book, the local authority doesn't give a damn. No stocking by local bookstores and they have done their work. Last week is the Golden Week associated with the Labor Day on 1st May, one of my friend visiting Hong Kong brought back this souvenir for me. It's the accounts of the interviews by Ms. Barbara Demick, a journalist with the L.A. Times newspaper, with North Korea's deflectors in South Korea, describing their lives back in North Korea. I am reading its first chapter, a deflected woman, who was a girl back then, talked about how she secretly dated a boy at nights by avoiding attentions from neighbors and their own families.

There was brief mentioning of the collapse of the North Korea's economy in the 1990s, which as Ms. Demick put it, was mainly the result of the termination of cheap oil supply from its big brother the USSR as a direct result of the downfall of the Soviet Union.

Maybe I wasn't concentrating while I was reading it. I think I should get back on the last chapter.

I think ...... wat was pretty much all I could say after finishing the whole thing, I really enjoyed it and it's very well written but I did find it quite hard to follow in a lot of places, stick it out though, it's worth it.